


phoenix suns

by winluvr



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:13:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26213191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winluvr/pseuds/winluvr
Summary: Oikawa calls him a dumb brute. Iwaizumi-san calls him a coward.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 21
Collections: Seijoh Week 2020





	phoenix suns

**Author's Note:**

> tried something new and wrote a little ode to kyoutani kentarou. might release a series or just a fanfic revolving around kyoutani ships :)

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me:  I am a free human being with an independent will.”

— Charlotte Bronte

  
  


Kentarou plays volleyball like he’s rolling the dice. Kunimi tells him that this isn’t Monopoly, where you’ll always have a calculated statistic of winning, where there will always be someone who comes out a winner. Instead, volleyball is more like a game of failure. You fail the first time you play, you fail the next time, fail a few more times. But you never stop trying. There isn’t exactly a skill you can utilize in the game of luck, so you just have to toughen up and net some experience points along the way. Level up a little and maybe you’ll win at least one game someday if you’re fortunate enough.

Kentarou knows all too well that volleyball doesn’t come with promises of success. Instead, it comes with compromises and unprecedented rounds of unpredictability. The failure tastes bitter on his tongue the first time he loses but there is no time for regret. Regret is catalogued as made-up bullshit in the back of the squiggles of his mind, too. Who could have predicted that Aoba Johsai, a powerhouse team back where they were from, would finally find one up-and-coming team to disrupt their string of successes? Unpredictable, indeed.

Unpredictability comes in colors Kentarou had not known. It comes in the shape of a blue-eyed setter and his bite-sized orange spiker, who had become more of a threat, more of a fiend than the gray-spiked baldie or the tall brown-haired one with a goatee whom Kentarou had confused for their coach at one point. (Though, truth be told, he respected him, even if just a little bit, because he looked like his hands are strong enough to whip Kentarou’s brute head back into shape.)

Strictly speaking, Kentarou moves on the instructions of his own gut instinct more than anything else. When his feet tell him to jump up and strike leather against gymnasium walls that smell strongly of Air Salonpas, he leaps. Flys high up into the air like black raven wings are sprouting out of his back, like he had transformed into a bird overnight. The mad dog turns into an eagle or perhaps some other predatory bird species, but still mad nonetheless. He couldn’t get rid of the unnerving passion, the overwhelming anger filling up his lungs so he embraces it. He jumps, higher and higher still.

When Kentarou’s hands scream at him to churn out all those reckless plays like someone could die at the very moment if he didn’t, he does. But when his hands bruise themselves on leather, its intense force scraping against his fingertips until they are left bleeding out dry, he does not take more than a moment to think about leaving the volleyball team. His hands did not hurt as much as the thought of giving up the one thing that he had loved most, but he had convinced himself enough that it was okay, that he would soon be free of his annoying seniors and their mouths that yap too much trying to talk to him. But really, his body ached more with the recurring thought that he couldn’t be useful anymore, without his hands that had served as his wings, his appendages. What’s the point of having relentless passion and skillful hands when he couldn’t put them to good use anymore?

It hadn’t been an act of rebellion when Kentarou scampered away from Oikawa’s domineering figure that day, running on the soles of his feet like the gymnasium was on fire. It was not quite an act of opposition to the Grand King either, nor a display of power over the others, you know, like some sort of wolf pack where he had crowned himself the alpha. Instead, it had been an act of submission, yielding to his authority in a rare display of a lack of resistance. Leaving the team felt more like going on his knees and bowing to Oikawa-san, felt utterly pathetic and pitiful, but what pissed him off a lot more is how his hands had thrown off the balance of his own body.

There had been waves of pain rolling under Kentarou’s skin in that moment, a gnawing ache unfurling above the spot where his bones meet. He wonders, for a split second, if this is what it feels like to be taken under the careful gaze of a butcher as he debones you. Terrifying, how the pain moves down from the throbbing skin of his jammed fingers to the taut skin of his thighs as the butcher slices through his body.

Independence, they called it. Kentarou couldn’t put a name to the sharp pang of pain whenever he pummeled the ball against the wall over and over, but he knew it wasn’t an act of independence. How stupid it is to think that something he did to remind himself of an earlier, more cautious version of himself was an act of independence. How many people had died in the name of liberty, pledging their allegiance to the country they had served until their own fellowmen beat them up until they turned black and blue? His body wasn’t what you would call an autonomous figure and his hands weren’t appendages that moved on their own like an accessory.

His parents christened him Kyoutani Kentarou. Oikawa calls him a dumb brute. Iwaizumi-san calls him a coward.

Iwaizumi-san thinks it’s an act of cowardice when he runs off to find another place, another host to sink his fangs into the moment his hands had failed to serve him, the moment that the volleyball had come flowing out of his hands. He thinks it’s stupid when he leaves the moment that his own power leaves him restless, searching for more and more things to circle his palm around in an attempt to establish dominance over them. Kentarou thinks it was more of a mistake to abandon something that he had once loved best, in the moment of his life where he had felt most welcome. 

Strictly speaking, Kentarou moves on impulse. It had been a split-second decision to quit volleyball sometime during his first year. None of them, not even Watari who often had the details on people, remember the specifics. None of them bother to know. His body heals itself sooner than later and immediately, he’s out to destroy himself again. He sets out and challenges everyone in his range of vision, pretending that his fingers don’t feel like they are scorching. He soon finds Iwaizumi-san to be worthy enough of his respect when he sits across from him and slams his closed fist against the wooden table. The sound of his whitened knuckles cracking against mahogany, threatening to leave splinters, resounding in his ears. His wrist pulses with the warmth of his hand.

What a wonderful sound it is, really. His eyes, burning with red fury flashing behind their lids, don’t leave Iwaizumi-san’s grinning face. It was less than an hour’s worth of a moment, but in that moment, they had been two wavering bodies in simultaneous motion. In that half-hour or so of a moment, Iwaizumi-san had clenched his jaw square, flexed his biceps in front of him, wiped his face with the inside of his shirt. He had flashed him that wide smile of his after he won and for a moment after that, Kentarou thinks he wouldn’t mind losing a thousand more times. Then, he thinks, what a loser he is.

Strictly speaking, there isn’t anything wrong with having a hot temper or being an immovable object that just won’t budge, no matter how hard you push against it. Still, being a spear in a team full of shields was enough to throw off their overall balance. Kentarou wonders if he should have tried a little harder to fit in, tuck his fangs into the back of his mouth, but they always stick out, threatening to sink themselves in someone else’s neck. It had been a risk for him to even let them grow out, but what’s done is done and a dog is a dog.

Kentarou entered the gymnasium and there, he set his eyes on Oikawa-san again. He did not look down at the ground in shame from the months he had spent furrowing somewhere else, trying to find himself outside the world of volleyball. He did not have any humiliation in his eyes expected of a boy who had spent months climbing up the walls and looking for new worlds only to crawl back to a place of familiarity. He did not care in the slightest, to be honest, about how Kindaichi had steered his gaze away from him— in fear?— or how in the corner of the room, Kunimi had rolled his eyes at all of the commotion going on. Instead, he barges himself in.

It throws them all off their rhythm, how this runaway boy had come out to play with them again after years of hiding and made an ill-received mark about how the seniors still hadn’t left the team like he had expected them to do. It pissed his captain off immensely, but Kentarou had refused to call him Oikawa-san like the other members. He had refused to acknowledge any of the other seniors that day. Hanamaki rolled his head back in a laugh, somehow finding something funny in the way he had slammed the door shut on his way out. Matsukawa had let out only a snicker that day, having run out of words. Iwaizumi-san merely shook his head.

Iwaizumi-san doesn’t chew him out after he returns that day, strolling into the gymnasium like it was his. He still does not reprimand him even when he had bludgeoned himself in the collision of bodies, elbowed himself into the smooth pour of a memorized toss and set. There’s no excuse for it. It hadn’t been a situation like that of Date Tech’s supersized setter, who had only half the game sense and experience as his height but showed enough promise to become a starter. It hadn’t been clumsiness that set him off. It was brute force, running from his veins to the tips of his fingers. It had always been his inherent savage violence acting faster than he could assess the situation. Still, he lets it. He lets his own hands tear off the muzzle, lets his grin flash his sharp teeth.

How long has it been since Kentarou had slammed his palm against the coarse leather of a stray volleyball threatening to fly out of bounds? How long has it been since he had let his paper thin skin be scrubbed raw at the tips, his fingernails chipped off with every smooth topspin serve that leaves all of them reeling? How long has it been since he had grinned at his opponent’s imposing figure, baiting them into receiving a feint only to split apart their high blocks with his full-power spikes? It hasn’t been long, really, since he let his own unrestrained urge for freedom seize him in its hands, control manifesting through the pulling of the strings of his back.

Kentarou rubs brown iodine over the closing wounds on his palms that day. It’s worth it, isn’t it, to bruise your own body on the violence of the sport you loved most? It had been a wonderful sensation for him, at least, to prick his own fingers chasing after ball after ball after ball, to cover his arms up with muscle relief patches like they were badges of victory. It wasn’t like his body was trying to get itself beat up, it wasn’t like he was trying to be a show-off. He was trying to reveal the fruitful results of his incessant pride finally paying off.

Strictly speaking, Kentarou does not usually think things, like missed tosses or the last set point, over. Thinks it’s bullshit, really, to care what anyone else thinks of him. Would things have been different if he had just been a little less reckless with his plays and a little more cooperative with his seniors, a little more willing to play along with Oikawa-san’s pretense that all is well? All wasn’t well, and he knew it the moment he came to court, his volleyball shoes grinding against the rolling linoleum floor like it had gotten heavier with the weight of everyone else’s expectations. Ah, but here he comes, still flying high, still rising up to spike like his life was on the line.

Kentarou slams his palm against the ball like he was being chased by a pack of crows. Or perhaps flock would be more fitting of a word, or perhaps even murder. The entirety of the Karasuno Volleyball Club weren’t exactly ones to give up easily, especially that pesky little number 10, who was only about half as tall as Kindaichi but twice as persistent with his plays. Either way, in line with his captain’s stupid philosophy about hitting it until it breaks or something, Kentarou does not run away from these crows, no matter how afraid he is.

Instead, Kentarou dives for the ball, his chest sliding over the smooth floor of the court, and climbs back up to his feet. Kentarou stops running away from the things that he fears. Tall middle blockers with their lethal read blocks and players half his size with their oddball quicks that catch him off-guard like the rest of the team and captains with their strong steady receives. Instead, he makes them fear him. Is there really any need to be running away from the things that behold you when there are far greater things in this uncertain world?

Kentarou stops running away from the middle blocker with the prescription sports glasses that looked kind of hideous on him. He bites back a smile when he sees him scampering to disrupt the lineage of serves that come between them.  _ Ah.  _ Kentarou hadn’t known he could move as swift, as agile as he is moving right now. Stops running away from his hands that try to shut his spikes down. Stops letting himself get baited into shooting around his blocks. He stops running away like they would suddenly get ahold of him and twist their grappling hands around their neck. Would they kill him? 

Was volleyball really a sport where people could die from one mistake, from one jump floater that hits the net, from one missed toss? To err is human and Kentarou had always been human. A mad dog, a lone wolf, sure, but human still. Was volleyball truly that cruel to his hopeful boy-heart?

It wasn’t. He knew it wasn’t, so what was the point of nearly twisting his ankle to receive that one last topspin serve, win that one last battle over the net? But Iwaizumi-san’s eyes dig into the back of his neck like he’s a little god stepping out here on Earth, trying to watch over him. So he reaches his hand out to retrieve that ball, just one more centimeter, and when his hand doesn’t reach it in time, he switches over to his foot. There’s a cheer in the crowd when he gets it up, yet his eyes aren’t on the girls holding their cute little banners on the second row, yet his ears aren’t listening in on the cheer of their school, yet his smile isn’t the kind of smile you would flash after a victory, but the kind of smile you would show a loved one. His eyes, his ears have always been on Iwaizumi.

Ah. But they lose that day. There had been too many missed plays, too many blind spots in their typical no-gaps defense. What would have been a little streak of hope washes away into a river of tears streaming down the volleyball court after the game. Iwaizumi-san stays back before they line up to receive their pity stares and  _ thank you for the game _ from the other team that had come out victorious this time. He wipes his face on the inside of his jersey, disappointment flowing down his cheeks in the form of tears, until Oikawa-san pats his hand against his back, then followed by Hanamaki and Matsukawa. Reassurance crammed into one touch of theirs.

They set off to clean up the gymnasium after the game and frankly, Kentarou could not care less about fixing the net or crying about the last ball that they had failed to retrieve. Still, he stays back with the whole team, and in minimal effort, murmurs a few words of encouragement to Yahaba. Yahaba blinks at him, confusion flashing upon his tear-stricken face, asking him if he’s okay. Kentarou does not know whether he is asking because it wasn’t really a common practice of his to offer comfort to his teammates or if it was because they had lost, devastatingly enough even though the sadness hadn’t come striking down like a landslide. Kentarou figures out that it’s more of the latter sooner or later and pats him on the back. An awkward gesture, but there was an attempt.

Kentarou flashes his black gaze toward Iwaizumi-san. There is a look of repression when he looks back at him and smiles and he thinks,  _ You don’t have to pretend anymore. _

The rest of his teammates head off to a remote ramen shop where they shove their faces into bowls of ramen to hide their tears. It’s a futile effort, really, because Oikawa-san cried louder than he could slurp up his buckwheat noodles. Kentarou doesn’t come with them, but the younger members take along a little bit of his presence by asking Iwaizumi-san if he’s okay, for him. Kindaichi offers Iwaizumi-san a wary smile after flooding the room with his tears that taste like salt. He doesn’t know how they know that he’s thinking about what Iwaizumi-san is feeling, but he appreciates the gesture.

Kentarou had walked home with Kunimi in silence that day. There’s an air of indifference surrounding him, as always. Kunimi looks at him, brown eyes dull and blank, but he does not ask how he feels. Instead, he carries his white duffel bag on one shoulder, balancing the weight on half of his body. He digs into the side compartment and offers Kentarou a sip of his Pocari Sweat. When Kentarou declines, he continues walking ahead, not looking back. The skies turn grapefruit pink above their heads.  _ Does it really matter anymore? _

The next day is filled with little banter about the whereabouts of the seniors. He doesn’t ask about Oikawa-san, whom he hears cried more tears that he had eaten bowls of ramen the next day. Iwaizumi-san finally let out a groan about how he had spent half his weekly allowance on their ramen. But the grunt sounded almost fond, almost full of heart. He doesn’t ask about how Oikawa-san had come out of the ramen shop grumbling about how his  _ shoyu  _ ramen reminded him of the little beast from Karasuno, the pesky middle blocker whose name Kentarou had not cared enough to tuck away in the back of his mind placed next to important things in his life.

He does not ask about Hanamaki, just Hanamaki, no suffix attached like any of the other members because he believed he hadn’t earned it quite yet, who had locked himself into his bedroom and burrowed his face into the blankets. He does not ask about Matsukawa either, whom he had treated with only an increment of respect higher than the others, who retreated out of the ramen shop with a blank face, without a second glance. He doesn’t ask about Watari, who had tried to console the others with a smile of comfort and those eyes who held sympathy in them. How pathetic it is, really, to be looked down upon with those pitiful eyes. How pathetic it is to be shown consolation when he didn’t ask for it. 

Consolation did not matter in the game of luck, in the grand scheme of things. He does not console Kindaichi either, nor does he offer more to Kunimi than a grunt and a wordless nod. Instead, he comes up to Iwaizumi-san. The way he approaches him is almost shy, almost nervous, like a bad dog coming out to play.  _ Ah,  _ Iwaizumi-san figures out,  _ even a boy as reckless as him could be somewhat gentle this way. _

“Iwaizumi-san,” Kentarou says. It’s almost polite, almost courteous for someone like him. “Stop crying,” he says. He’s trying, really, to show a little empathy. “It’s embarrassing.”

Iwaizumi-san looks him in the eye and laughs. He never stops laughing. He’s laughing, still, even when Kentarou lets out a cough. What a wonderful sound it is. It’s always been.

Kentarou straightens up beside him, startling from the sound of Iwaizumi-san’s voice. “What’s so funny,” he says. 

Iwaizumi-san presses his hand against his back. It’s warm. He tucks a promise in the shell of his ear, telling him that this is not the end. Hah. He does not tell him any corny shit or any tear-stricken words of congratulations that he knows would just go out from the other end. Instead, he shapes him up to become an ace in his prime to follow in his footsteps.

It doesn’t end here yet, Kyoutani. It only begins here.

Strictly speaking, Iwaizumi-san wasn’t destined to become a butcher or perhaps a caterer. He had always known that he would, someday, become an athletic trainer or something. Kentarou didn’t know what he was doing in his life. He didn’t know if his barely good enough grades would take him to a good enough university to please his parents, doesn’t know what course he would take once he does get in one, doesn’t know what path to take once he hops off into uncertainty. He figures out sooner or later that he wanted to further improve his skill and turn it into his profession. Soon enough, some recruiters knock on his door the moment he finishes college with a diploma he could not care less about. Which is good, really, because if he feared anything, he feared uncertainty.

A Division 2 team in Japan’s V-League by the name Sendai Frogs take him in sometime after he finishes his degree. And so, he is free. He’s finally free to launch himself into the air and flash his fangs to the world. He hadn’t whittled his teeth down even when he had undergone so much pressure to be a little bit more graceful, a little bit more cautious, a little bit less like himself. There isn’t space to repress himself here.

And so, he slams his palm against the ball, his hand turning into a full-power missile, to launch an insane high-speed inner spike. It misses the court, if only by a millimeter, but it feels good, doesn’t it. It feels liberating, like he’s free to fly. 

Kentarou laughs at himself this time. He laughs, laughs and laughs. What a wonderful sound, isn’t it, amidst the sharp sound of muscle breaking under his skin and the loud buzz of cicadas whistling in his ears. He’s free and he’s endless.


End file.
